I heard that this Australian film was a big hit at the cinema, and it was rated five stars out of five by the critics, so I had to see if I was going to agree with them. Basically seventeen year old Joshua 'J' Cody (James Frecheville) has been pretty much chucked out of his Melbourne based family, despite certain members having criminal backgrounds themselves. After J witnesses her mother Julia overdose and die from a heroin overdose, and feeling slightly detached reconnects with grandmother Janine 'Smurf' Cody (Oscar and Golden Globe nominated Jacki Weaver) and lives with her. She is the matriarch, but has an incestuous love with her three sons, quiet but menacing Andrew 'Pope' Cody (Ben Mendelsohn), hyperactive Craig Cody (Sullivan Stapleton) and not very old Darren Cody (Luke Ford). Pope and best friend Barry 'Baz' Brown (Joel Edgerton) do armed robberies, with Darren as apprentice, and Craig deals drugs, and with Pope in hiding the Melbourne Armed Robbery Squad are after him. The standoff between the Squad and the Codys is taken up a level, and a war starts to emerge, with innocent people and J, who only finds ground with girlfriend Nicky Henry (Laura Wheelwright), caught in amongst it. Homicide Detective Senior Sergeant Nathan Leckie (Guy Pearce) knows the Codys are involved in some of the deaths, he tries to get J on his side, but he is more interested in getting himself out of the situation, he trusts neither side. Also J wants to exact justice as he considers putting right all things in the bad situation, and in the end I presume he does, to be honest, I didn't understand everything going on. Also starring Dan Wyllie as Ezra White and Anthony Hayes as Detective Justin Norris. If it wasn't for the fact that I couldn't figure out what was going on I may have agreed with the high rating by the critics, certainly there are some eye-catching moments, good acting, and I guess a good script, so it is certainly not a crime drama you would want to miss. Very good!
Review of Animal Kingdom
